


Second Chances

by Ghost0fWinter



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Bruce Wayne is a Good Father, Deaged Jason Todd, Gen, Jason Todd is Robin, PapaBat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-21
Updated: 2017-04-21
Packaged: 2018-10-22 06:25:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10691574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghost0fWinter/pseuds/Ghost0fWinter
Summary: It is not often someone is given a second chance to make something right.





	Second Chances

**Author's Note:**

> This is based on a RP plot that I was doing with my boyfriend. Jason gets deaged, reverting back to Robin, before he had been killed. He has no memories of his time as Red Hood, or of anything that happens to him. He's just a dumb kid with a love for literature.

 

 

Bruce was standing by the door, hip leaning against the frame. There was an odd feeling of nostalgia being here; an odd feeling of nostalgia watching a young fourteen year old Jason huddled up by the window and reading one of those first edition Jane Austen books that he and Alfred were so fond of collecting.

Jason's eyes were glued to the book, eating up the words on the pages like he hung on every single one of them. Bruce knew it wasn't the first time Jason's read Pride and Prejudice, but he knew that it was one of Jason's favorite. After his death he had gone to the library and skimmed his fingers along the spines of the books. They were all in mint condition, but if one looked hard enough they could see the slight wear on the spine of one particular book.

He had never had the heart to donate the books. Alfred and Jason had put too much effort and love into collecting them that he couldn't bare to part with them. The Gotham Library would've loved to have them, they would've benefited greatly from them, and some collectors would have wanted them too. But they had traces of Jason on them--memories that he didn't want to part with. Books were books, but they meant something to Jason.

They meant the world.

When Jason had come back, he hadn't once looked at the library; hadn't once even picked up one of the books again. Seeing him here, back as a young teen still naive and trusting and loving, instead of the cold hard man he had become, it... it made his heart ache.

He knew the ending to his story. Jason wouldn't stay the loving and bright young boy he is. He would grow cold, distant, angry. He would push away until it lead to his death, and there was nothing Bruce could do to change that. But maybe this just once he could fix something he never did when Jason was young.

"What're you reading?"

Jason didn't look up, instead skimmed his finger along the thin pages of the book as he turned it. "Pride and Prejudice."

"Jane Austen? That's quite the literature you're reading." Bruce pushed away from the door and moved over to the chair that Jason was using. It was his favorite. Red leather with polished pillows right next to the window, a reading lamp above him and a blanket draped across his shoulders. His knee was tucked under him, the other propped up in a position Bruce wasn't sure was comfortable.

"My favorite." Jason said, green eyes finally dragging away from the words of the page to look up at Bruce. "Something you need, B?"

"No." Bruce said as he leaned against the windowpane, arms crossing over his chest again. "I read that once. Alfred insisted. I never understood it, to be honest."

Jason was sitting up now, his interest having shifted from the book to Bruce. "Really? What's not to understand? Maybe you're just dumb and have bad taste."

Bruce snorted a bit, the corners of his lips twitching into a small smile. "Why don't you explain it to me then? There was something about the opening of the book I never got. The--"

" _'It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife'_." Jason quoted, not having to look down at the book which laid closed on his lap now. "It's a sentence filled with irony and playfulness. The novel revolves around the necessity of marrying for love, not simply for mercenary reasons despite the social pressures to make a good wealthy match."

Sometimes Bruce forgot how much of a scholar Jason used to be--still was. He was a theater kid; talented beyond belief and his love for literature almost matched that. He was smart, and not just in academics, and it showed sometimes in bursts of brilliance like this.

Bruce's smile grew a little wider as he sat down on the chair beside Jason's. He crossed on leg over the other, simply allowing himself to listen to Jason talk about the book--about the characters and the plot and the reasons behind everything. He listened and asked questions and they had discussions because second chances don't come around often in a lifetime, and now that he had one, he wasn't going to let it go.


End file.
